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Wednesday, 10 June 2009

Home run on first strike

When the London tube strike was announced, it sounded like the whole underground system would be in melt-down. I knew full well that all of the solutions Boris and TFL had outlined (free boats on the Thames, cycle-buddies, maps for walking etc) meant nothing to me making my way from the far North East to the far North West. It looked like I would have to circumvent London via one long train and four buses, and a conservative estimate of that journey had me arriving at my desk by Christmas. But lucky for me, lovely job said I could work from home, and so I did.

I love working from home. There are so many things you can do – work AND run the washing machine, work AND use the dishwasher, work AND tidy room (I was waiting for software to load, honest), work AND watch catch up TV of The Apprentice (it was lunch-time, ok?). But the best thing is the day meant I had a lovely day breathing space. Ok, it wasn’t quite hiding under the duvet, but it was a respite of sorts, and I think I needed it. Tomorrow looks a whole new option, as careful study of the TFL website throughout the day shows there are tubes if you know where to look (behind that plant pot, under that bridge) and I might be able to do some random type of tube hop-scotch to get in to work. Although, I still suspect that the last jump on the hop-scotch will be a bus. This is where I examine maps from all angles and decide that I should wait at 'A' and catch bus 221, when I really should be waiting at 'C' and getting bus 17.

The only problem with negotiating a skeleton service is that even though you know London is crammed full of people, it is only times like this you realise just how many people live and work here. It hits you in the face, you cannot avoid the fact it is desperately overcrowded, and yet somehow usually we all sail around each other, lost in our own little bubbles. Strikes mean our bubble bursts and we are left bleating in pens (stations, as we usually like to call them). Oh well, bed beckons.

Jayne Ferst

In the 1970s a girl was born and sent to school for a crime she didn't commit. That girl finally escaped from a dull comprehensive into the lost artistic underground. Today, still wanted by her job, she survives as a writer of fortune. If you need a story, if no one else can help, and if you remember the A Team theme tune, maybe you can sing it with me.